Drift
by Dark Ice Dragon
Summary: "Tao," was all Takeo said, an eyebrow raised in expectation, seeing Tao standing as innocently as he could in the doorway of their room, a shopping bag in hand.


**Summary**: "_Tao,_" was all Takeo said, an eyebrow raised in expectation, seeing Tao standing as innocently as he could in the doorway of their room, a shopping bag in hand.

Takeo/Tao/M-21 or friendship. Same as usual. :3

Set in one of the interludes after season two.

Uh, either a companion piece to A Good Night's Sleep, a continuation of it, or just another fic with a more central theme around Takeo's hair, because I felt like it. XD;;;

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**************Drift**

By Dark Ice Dragon

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"_Tao,_" was all Takeo said, an eyebrow raised in expectation, seeing Tao standing as innocently as he could in the doorway of their room, a shopping bag in hand.

"Hmm?" He was grinning, but not entering. Yet.

Takeo sighed, not even attempting to wonder what Tao had planned this time. "What did you buy."

"Nothing much, just a couple of brushes and hair ties…?"

"And?"

"No ribbons," Tao replied, grinning wider now as he stepped into their room.

Shaking his head, Takeo cleaned the last of the gun oil from his hands and then grabbed one of the chairs and sat on it, flipping his hair over the back. It didn't take Tao long to start, the rustle of the bag only happening for a second before Tao's hands was gentle carding through his hair, deftly separating them into sections.

"Why'd you buy them?" Takeo asked, already relaxing at the rhythm Tao was doing, soft and slow. He played with the hair tie he usually wore, flexing it around his fingers.

"No reason, really. Just saw 'em in a shop, and thought we'd been busy enough for you not to have enough time to look after your hair as well as you usually do-" Takeo snorted "-aaaand we wouldn't want to chop half of it off because it became too tangled."

Takeo shook his head –it had been a hectic couple of days, but it was not enough to justify _that_- and Tao tapped him on the head with the brush.

"Hey, don't move so much."

In retaliation, Takeo tried to swat the brush away and his fingers only connected with it briefly before Tao hit his hand.

"You're going to undo everything if you keep moving," Tao mock scolded, laughter in his voice.

"You haven't had enough time _to_ do anything," Takeo retorted, but he stilled anyway, his eyes narrowing. Tao may have said he hadn't bought _ribbons_, but there were so many other things that he could have bought to put into Takeo's hair.

"What are you two doing?" a quietly resigned voice said from their doorway.

"Making sure we don't have to burn Takeo's-"

Takeo raised his hand and flicked his hair tie into Tao's face.

"Ack!"

With a quiet huff of laughter, M-21 padded in and peered into the shopping bag. "Need a mediator?" M-21 asked him, an amused smile on his face.

"Make sure there's no glitter," Takeo said flatly.

"Hey!"

"There's only another brush and packets of hair ties in here."

Tao waved his brush, but there was no hiding the grin in his voice. "I said that!" There was a small pause. "M-21, go grab the other brush – if you're the mediator, you're going to have to make sure I don't have anything up my sleeves and this way, we'll be faster anyway."

"…Takeo?"

He shrugged, holding his hand out at his shoulder, and someone gave him back his hair tie. "It's fine." He'd already agreed to Tao fixing his hair.

"All right."

Takeo's hair was separated into two sections and Tao and M-21 started brushing his hair, making comments about some of the things they'd seen over the course of the day, or what they felt like doing afterwards. Takeo didn't really pay that much attention, content to just let the sounds wash over him, closing his eyes and drifting in his senses.

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If this is set with A Good Night's Sleep, I'm not sure how Tao lost the last pair of brushes, but I sort of picture him as both having a meticulous side when it's about his/their room because of habits formed in the Union, but also having the messiest side of the three of them since they're no longer with them. Not to mention, wires being _everywhere _in the very least. I doubt Frankenstein goes into their room to clean too. XD But that's my headcanon.

For the 'roommates' square for Cottoncandy Bingo.

Some day, I'll hopefully write Tao messing about with Takeo's hair (mostly with permission. XD). Or try to explain what the heck Takeo's been doing with his hair in the recent chapters because... Wow.


End file.
